PARENTS OF ELIAS R.
WIGHTMAN, GRANTEE OF THE MATAGORDA TOWN LEAGUE, FROM
REPUBLIC OF MEXICO.

BENJAMIN AND ESTHER
WIGHTMAN, NATIVES OF CONNECTICUT, LIVED IN WIGHTMAN TOWN,
HERKIMER COUNTY, N. Y., BEFORE JOINING (1828) COLONY BROUGHT
HERE BY THEIR SON ON “LITTLE ZOE”, THE FIRST SAILING VESSEL
EVER TO ENTER PORT OF MATAGORDA. …

Benjamin Wightman, the son of Abraham and Susanna
(Stark) Wightman, was born on August 31, 1755, in Norwich, Connecticut.
He was the fourth generation of the Wightman family in America. He
married Esther Randall, the daughter of Rufus and Margaret (Wightman)
Randall. She was born in Cochester, Connecticut, on December 4, 1758.

The Wightmans emigrated from Montville, Connecticut,
to Herkimer County, New York, where the settlement became known as
Whitmantown. Benjamin was a Baptist minister, and both he and his wife
were lineally descended from colonial clergymen; among those were
Valentine Wightman, Obadiah Holmes, and Roger Williams, first governor
of Rhode Island.

During the American Revolution, Benjamin Wightman
served as a private in Colonel Willet’s Tryon County Rangers of New
York. Benjamin Wightman is the only known Revolutionary War veteran
buried in Matagorda County.

Benjamin and Esther had nine daughters and two sons.
The daughters were Jerusha, Lydia, Eunice, Lucy, Susan, Esther,
Margaret, Amy and Clarissa. The two sons were Elias and Dimmis.

In 1828 Elias Wightman, a surveyor for Stephen F.
Austin, brought a group of colonists from New York to
Matagorda—including his parents, Benjamin and Esther, and his sisters,
Jerusha and Margaret. They traveled down the Mississippi River by
flatboat to New Orleans. From New Orleans they sailed on the schooner
Little Zoe to Matagorda. The journey was long and difficult as told in
Mary (Sherwood) Wightman Helm’s memoirs, Scraps of Early Texas History.

Esther (Randall) Wightman died June 20, 1830, and was
the first person to be buried in the Matagorda Cemetery. Six weeks
later, her husband Benjamin died and was buried beside her. Their
coffins were made of lumber from New Orleans and taken to the cemetery
by ox-drawn carts.

One league of land from the mouth of Caney Creek and
including part of Matagorda Peninsula, was granted to the heirs of
Benjamin Wightman, October 28, 1930.

Members of the Bluebonnet Chapter # 41, Sons of the Revolution, Marble
Falls, Texas and
members of several other SAR chapters across Texas, gathered in
Matagorda Cemetery at the grave of Revolutionary War soldier, Benjamin
Wightman, Friday morning, July 11, 2014, at 10 a. m. A Sons of the
American Revolution marker was placed on the only Revolutionary War
veteran grave in Matagorda County. The Bluebonnet Chapter wanted to
honor the family member of their member, Ralph Whitman, who lives in
Burnet, Texas. The program included a color guard dressed in
Revolutionary War uniforms as well as a musket salute. Approximately 50
members of the Matagorda Cemetery Association,
Matagorda County
Historical Commission, Mary Rolph Marsh Chapter DAR and residents of
Matagorda were in attendance in addition to the SAR members.